


soulmates are the exception

by hannieks



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, How Do I Tag This, M/M, fairytale AU, help i’ve written too much fluff, ok its tangled but voltron
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-24
Updated: 2017-12-24
Packaged: 2019-02-19 22:36:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13133646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannieks/pseuds/hannieks
Summary: Keith had spent millenia trapped in his tower, nothing to keep him company except an evil witch and a ginger ferret named Coran.Lance was a criminal known kingdom wide, on the run after having stolen a crown.(You know the story of Rapunzel, but do you know it with these dorks?)





	soulmates are the exception

**Author's Note:**

> holy shit. this has killed me, i’m not writing again for a w h i l e.  
> it’s a christmas miracle this got out on time, if i’m honest.  
> written for amie, one of my closest friends! merry christmas hon, hope u love all the pidge in this!  
> if there’s any plot holes or mistakes don’t hesitate to let me know, but enjoy!  
> DISCLAIMER: any references or similarities to tangled i’m not taking any credit for. that belongs to disney entirely.

**soulmate**  
**ˈsəʊlmeɪt/**  
**noun**  
**a person suited to another as a close friend or romantic partner.**

\--

Nobody could control how life panned out. Nobody could be certain of anything. Still - Allura was sure that the Galra were a race so blinded by their own ego they couldn’t see morality.

Even as she thought this, a sigh of guilty relief escaped her mouth. Time in the mortal world passed much slower than hers did, and she'd seen wars won and alliances formed. Still, ever since Zarkon betrayed Altea it was like an eternity had passed.

Ten thousand years, to be precise.

His constant power-hungry plots had given her quite the headache - and worse, his rule caught her off guard. The shock wave knocked countless of Allura’s soul pairings off course, to her chagrin.

Love was long overdue, to light up smiles once again and give hope to her dismal subjects in Altea.

Allura nodded to herself. She turned to a shelf filled with various potions, picking a vial from her collection. It sang melodies of joy louder than Jupiter’s thunder, and twinkled brighter than any other.

The vial held a drop of pure sunlight, with the power to heal the sick and save innocent love from the lure of evil.

But the question arose - which soul should she give the energy to?

A soul that knew pain and still stood taller than anyone else. One who enjoyed an adventure, but had someone to pull them back if they ventured too far. A life with a future full of people who encouraged them to use their gift for righteousness.

 _Blah, blah, blah._ the whole ‘destiny has chosen a path’ thing bored her. Her creation was only to bring people together, not go on forever about fate. She could only give them a head start, not plan out their every endeavour.

As long the sun lived he would live, their soulmate too. Only one pairing had births so far apart, which meant… Hmm.

With her mind made up she flipped through her book, and after some searching (soul searching?) she found them.

Keith Kogane, Lance McClain.

Yes, they would be an exquisite, tragic pair, radiating determination.

She exhaled and massaged her forehead, and some of the tension left her shoulders. They'd been on her mind for a while; it was nice to know she had a plan of action.

There was one problem. Both of them had infinite amounts of tenacity, too proud to admit anything. The witch had cursed the soul to stay mute - not exactly an easy problem to fix.

Allura could do many things, but she couldn’t control the actions of crushing teenage boys.

Never mind. She could deal with it in ten millennia, when the second one was born and the romantic drama began.

She emptied the vial of sunlight into the former’s soul, alongside a drop of the rainbow, and smiled. His life would be tough, but he’d meet his soulmate before he lost all motivation, she hoped.

His brother lived to protect him, keep him hidden from those who wanted him for themselves.

She oversaw soldiers ripped them apart, grimaced when they tore an arm from his brother.

He couldn't answer their interrogations - how could he? He didn’t know a thing - nobody did but Allura herself.

For them, it would get a thousand times worse before it got better.

It was out of her control. These events, awful, life changing things, weren’t ones she was free to reverse or alter. She could do many things, but she couldn’t change people's bad decisions, couldn't take away their free will.

But as a witch cast a fatal curse on the brother after he refused to conform to her demands, Allura scowled. Galra messed up her plans, seemed to only target her well thought out plots for true love. (Heartless monsters.)

She bit her lip - this threw several spanners in her works, so to speak. Even so, no matter what order they were in, she knew they couldn’t save Shiro.

She slumped over the deck, defeated. Destiny caused his demise, no doubt about it, and it was all she could do to ensure his brother didn’t witness it.

Allura needed a holiday.

\--

Keith woke up with a shuddering gasp, bolt upright in bed.

Pushing back his sweaty hair his hands shook, heart pounding as he hyperventilated.

It’d been awhile since he’d dreamt of his mother.

Coran came to his side, chirping in concern.

 _I'm fine_ , he assured.

The ferret knew he was lying, but he couldn’t do much but give the limited comfort a ferret could give. Coran proposed a game of chess as a distraction, and they played until he became bored and scurried away.

Keith checked the time.

Four hours had passed - it was seven am. A reasonable time to get out of bed and go about his day.

First, his hair. It trailed behind him like the shackling wards surrounding the tower. Magic, hair aside, he had to brush it from time to time - a task which used a good hour and a half of his day.

Annoyance bubbles under his skin. It was difficult to stay calm when a witch kept him captive in the most boring tower ever created.

Staying conscious was also a challenge. He'd almost dropped off three times in one hour. The one thing keeping him awake was the fact that his dreams were no respite from reality, and never would be. But the constant loss of energy drained him, to indescribable levels. For a while he lay in the kind of drifting limbo only exhaustion could grant you, mind reeling.

Keith supposed he'd spent years staring out of the window, looking out on a world he longed to experience. He watched bricks crumble, seen emerald ivy and honeysuckle crawl ever closer.

(He was never away from the sun for long. If he strayed too far it was like every ounce of energy left him in one fell swoop, forced him back to recharge. It was due to his one task - being the energy source for Zarkon. He lived as long as Keith wanted him to live, for as long as the sun was in the skies. If he didn’t keep Haggar’s master alive she’d find a way to kill the sun, he was certain.)

The birds were old friends. Their stunning feathers flitted from tree to tree, songs never failing to cheer him up after an awful day. Sometimes he'd hum along to their choir of voices, melodic and ethereal.

There wasn’t much else to occupy himself with, apart from sitting by the window or cleaning or reading.

Of course, there was Haggar to wait for, but Haggar was Satan’s cousin three times removed in the body of a witch.

Instead, Keith practised his sword. He would need the recap on his combat skills if he ever escaped the clutches of the witch.

At least, he tried to practise, losing focus too many times to count under the midday sun. It wasn't until he smacked his blade into a wall that he gave up.

Instead, Keith swept the floors and dusted the shelves, fixed his appearance in the mirror.

His reflection mocked him with shadowed eyes and hair with a blue tint.

Sometimes he wished he wasn't the way he was. There’s no way he'd find a soulmate seventy feet up and alone, and it wasn't like he described himself as 'bubbly'.

Ugh, his thoughts were impossible to escape like this. Finally he managed to exhaust himself, after what felt like a year.

He was sure he could take another round of practise, feel that sweet relief of knowing he was being useful.

The world took that moment to spin, indicating that he actually should go lie down. (Oops.)

Keith collapsed onto his bed, spotting a book poking out from underneath it. A fairy tale, of course.

When he was more naive Keith dreamed of adventure, exploring with someone who knew him and loved him. He dreamed of his very own Prince Charming to take him away from the wicked witch.

Still, he wasn't invincible. Centuries of nothing but Haggar taking from him passed, and his heart had hardened. He learned the hard way that wishful thinking couldn’t change the future.

Everything paused, all rules broken, for the sake of true love. It would’ve sickened him, if he wasn’t such a pathetic romantic.

He was alone, in a world where his gift was his only asset, where people never saw him, only saw through him. Things like love shouldn't have been a concern.

A squeak from Coran put him on high alert for the fifth time that morning, and he rushed to the ferret.

 _Is she near?_ It'd been so fucking long, and he knew he shouldn’t be so wary of her.

Despite that Keith would never speak to the woman. He was in no rush to befriend the witch that killed his brother.

Coran, perched on the windowsill, turned to him and shakes his head. So Haggar was late, and would later arrive with a mood like someone shoved Zarkon himself up her ass.

Splendid news for him.

Ugh, he was so bored. Couldn't someone show up and entertain him, before he died of routine?

\--

Pidge closed her eyes and mumbled an incantation. Seconds later, an almost transparent bubble surrounded their makeshift station.

Invisibility charms were hard to cast, and Lance was grateful to have her intellect on his side. From experience involving drunk bets, he knew nobody should try and fight her.

Hunk cracked his knuckles and unfolded the castle’s blueprint. (It was immaculate, as it should be - the paper was hell to draw up given half the places in it were illegal to the public eye.)

“If my calculations are correct, we should be on top of the tiara right… now.”

Pidge adjusted her glasses with an affirmative hum. “This’ll go one of two ways. We could get away with the heist of our lives, or it could be a complete shit show.”

“Language, child.” Lance reprimanded, always the tease.

“Suck a cock!”

He glared, but that’s all he did - they didn't have time for petty arguments. Also a teeny bit because if they fought too much Hunk wouldn’t make any victory cookies.

Hunk triple-checked everything like the mother hen he was. His fluffy, teddy bear personality didn't suit his criminal lifestyle or his tree trunk of a body. It was like how Pidge’s intelligence was much older than her years or that Lance’s bravado wasn't his true self at all.

Everyone had their reasons for joining this line of work. Lance had known that for a long time.

“Lance? You okay, buddy?”

He forced himself back into action with a goofy grin and a click of his finger guns. “Never been better, baby.”

Pidge pushed her glasses back up her nose. “This should be a barrel of laughs.”

On his way down, Lance discovered with relief the room was almost unguarded. Even for extravagant stuck up empires like the Galra, it was egotistical - and very helpful.

They were dicks to non-Galran races. That was most races, so nobody felt any remorse for stealing one of their most valued possessions.

The Unilu guy promised four billion units for the Red Tiara of Altea. They all had mouths to feed, so there wasn't much debate at the Three Mice over whether they would steal it or not.

Even split between the twenty-odd of them, four billion units was an absolute shit ton of money. Enough for Lance to run from the life he lived and find his family again.

The rope jolted to a stop right below the tiara and Lance returned to the present for the second time that day. Damn, had to get that daydreaming under control, it wasn't protocol.

It happened far too often, broke his character long enough for others to notice. He was professional, and if he wanted to keep himself safe he had to keep it that way.

Anyway, he gave up his clean criminal record years ago. Dwelling on the past wasn't worth the heartache.

Why were none of the guards watching the one thing they’re protecting? Heh. This would be a piece of cake.

Grabbing the bounty and slipping it into a satchel, he was about to tug on the rope when a guard sneezed. Call him dramatic, but Lance couldn't resist a memorable exit - which was when it all went wrong.

“Bless you.”

He tugged the wire twice and flipped Pidge and Hunk the okay with his free hand. Everything had gone to plan.

“Thanks.” Replied the idiot with slow as fuck reflexes. The guy spun around, fumbling with his sword, but Lance was faster, slipping away.

“I have it!” He exclaimed, brandishing the satchel with an excited gleam in his eyes.

They heard the gallop of hooves, and Pidge facepalmed. “But we need to run. Like, now.”

They sprinted into the forest, then even further. The Garrison knights kept close behind, thumping in rhythm to Lance’s racing heart.

“I hope calzones start falling outta the sky right now.” Hunk sighed, which annoyed Lance because now he wanted food.

(Lance can never stay mad at Hunk. He forgave his friend after no debate.)

He risked a glance behind him. The horses were right on their tail.

“We gotta split up!”

The others nodded, taking off in separate directions.

“We’ll meet at the Three Mice!” Hunk assured, and how could his voice sound comforting when they were on the run?

Now alone, Lance continued straight on. That is, until he caught a glance of a familiar wanted poster in his peripheral. Sure enough, _Lance McClain_ was there before him, in angry print. _DEAD OR ALIVE._

He considered destroying it, but the rumble of Galra reminded Lance of his time restraint. He settled for ripping the poster off the tree, shoving it into the satchel.

The plan ran well. Lance was tall, a fast runner - all he had to do was get to their base without capture, and he was home free.

By the time the Galra got there it'd be too late. The bar would be full of civilians by that point, and the satchel with Shay, who’d then transport it to the Unilu dude.

Lance was having a halfway decent day - at least until that dumb horse showed up, void of a rider yet right in front of him.

There was a second where neither of them moved, staring one another down. His hand moved towards the satchel and, with a glare capable of terrifying Zarkon, the horse went for him.

Oh shit. The horse was quick, but Lance was quicker. Still, winning this race was down to one thing: knowledge of the track. (And the threat of an evil equine stomping on him was also an incentive to get away, ASAP.)

Lance ran at full throttle until the horse fell behind and, in a rare stroke of luck, he found refuge in a hidden nook. Holding his breath, he pressed himslef flat against the wall of the cave.

A famous outlaw, cornered by a damn horse. He wanted to laugh at the incredulity of it all because a horse. A horse.

Said horse started snuffling about outside. Lance shut his eyes - as if it'd makes him invisible - praying to deities he hadn't even heard of that the horse would miss him.

Lance realised he was yet to make plans for his end, apart from the promise of Hunk avenging him. If he died, would his hair look good? If people saw him as an unkempt criminal he'd never go down as a heroic martyr.

(Funny, how the pretend personality sneaked into his thoughts.)

(He preferred it that way.)

He risked peeking outside with wide eyes and spots a grey muzzle pressed to the ground. A lump rose in his throat and he clamped a hand over his mouth, terrified he’d make an undignified sound.

To his relief, the horse lost interest in the nook and stalked away, irritated at being unable to find him.

Lance thanked past him for not saving the apple he’d eaten for breakfast, or he might not have been safe.

 _Phew_.

There was no way he could head out the cave, not with the psycho horse close, but he couldn't wait there - he needed to get back. No tiara, no units.

Lance, after double- no, triple checking the horse was nowhere in sight, turned his back to the opening of the cave.

A curtain of vines on the opposite side had revealed themselves. As his only hope of escape they glimmered in the midday sun.

Given that vines once saved him, it wasn't delusional to hope something on the other side could help? Right? He must've been going insane, after so much deceit and stealing.

Fuck it. With a last cautious check behind him, Lance crept through the veil of green, and suppressed a gasp.

Beyond him lay a garden, complete with sunlight slipping past leaves and blue skies. A lake with a waterfall and splashing fish drew his attention, water gleaming bright. The trees surrounding them are giant-like. They must’ve seen thousands of lives come and go, and see even more walk through the forest. Wildflowers covered grass with rainbows of petals, a display that shouldn't have been.

In the centre lay a tower as derelict as the rest of the garden. It was obvious the building was old, charmed or warded to stay standing, but still he was wary of heading too close. Still, his other option was that horse, so...

The garden hid itself away from everyone else, society and rules and judgement. It was like some paradise, frozen in time.

Granted, there weren't many places as picturesque, but was older than anything he’d ever seen. The quiet, everyone-here-died quiet, gave him the creeps, big time, and it was Galra territory. Lance was fearless but not that fearless, thanks.

There wasn't much choice - the valley was eerie, but if he left that Garrison horse would spot him. He'd get arrested, then hanged.

Not exactly how he wanted to spend his Thursday.

He inspected the tower but failed to find a door, concluding that there was one way in, which was through the window.

Right at the top. Seventy feet tall.

Lance deliberated over how in Altea he’d get up that high. His satchel contained nothing but the tiara and the poster. Weapons wise, all he had was a bow and arrow, which irritated him to no end.

Wait.

Arrows!

Pulling them from his quiver he dug the heads into the brickwork, wincing as the stone crumbled with ease.

This would take a long while to climb, and his arms would kill him, but anything was better than that dumb smug horse.

\--

Long, gruelling minutes passed, filled with hard labour.

Lance made it to the top of the tower, crawling over the window and flopping on like a fish in a desert.

He ignored the quiet shuffling sound, and in hindsight Lance noted it was a pretty dumb move.

Heaving himself up and pulling the tiara out of the satchel, he ran his fingertips over the rubies.

“Alone at last.” he muttered, exhaustion seeping into his veins.

There were quick footsteps, a clang, then nothing.

\--

Keith stretched his arms over his head, working out the cramps in his shoulders. He was halfway through organising a bookshelf when he heard a crash, then curses in a voice he'd never heard.

He watched Coran from his peripheral, ensuring he made it to safety before moving himself.

He had read in a book somewhere that life had a way of dishing things out right as you asked for them. Keith couldn't decide if he was happy or annoyed it was true.

He dropped his book and grabbed a frying pan, sneaking behind him and smacking the guy in the head. He went down fast (faster than some of the men in Coran’s... more _explicit_ books.)

So now there is a man on Keith's floor, and his morning has travelled from zero to a hundred in less than a tick.

The guy wasn't unattractive, by anyone's standards, and he didn't seem malevolent.

There was no fangs, not like Keith, but his lips were so delectable he couldn't help running a finger along them. He jerked back, he shouldn't have done that that was weird-

The guy looked- well he looked warm. Warmer than Keith, warmer than fire, warmer than love.

Keith wanted to hug him. He'd do much more given the chance, but he wasn't about to admit that to himself.

He would have come across as strange, anyway. Courting had changed after all this time, and there was the question of whether he liked guys or not, and-

Keith’s brain was going to shut up.

(He assured himself he wasn't fighting down a blush.)

Coran leaped off Keith’s shoulder with a grace most ferrets don’t have, landing on the man’s head. It snapped Keith out of his reverie, and he sent an affirmative thought over in the bond.

He sniffed the man once, examined him, opened his locket, then turned to Keith. Coran’s interrogation was over - and he approved, if the continuous winking was anything to go by.

_Shut up._

He was halfway through tying the man up when his bond with Coran twitched.

No… that wasn't him.

So who was it? Forming links was difficult, borderline impossible.

He hadn't been able to form a link with Shiro, and he was the closest Keith had been to anyone.

(The exception to the rule was true love, because the exception to every rule was true love, his brain lets him know. Keith decided to stop listening to the logical part of his thoughts.)

It must've been the guy he's tying up being weird, that was all. Strange fucker, with strange clothes and strange bond-forming abilities.

He sighed. At least this killed his boredom, and if all went well he’d get to see those floating stars.

\--

Lance woke up, which was a better outcome than he was expecting. It also meant he was captured, which could end badly.

 _Okay. Stay calm._ The first thing Shay had taught him about interrogation is to take note of your surroundings - easy enough.

He was tied to a chair, not blindfolded, so whoever caught him was in a rush. Second, his mean headache would need tending to sooner or later. Third, he was in an unfamiliar place with an invaluable stolen tiara in his satchel.

Come to think of it, the satchel was neither on him or in his line of sight. Fuck.

Was he dead? He was so dead, and his hero would look down on him from the heavens. (More than he did on a typical day, you know, with Lance a criminal and Takashi Shirogane a legend.)

This was the worst day ever.

Movement from the shadows grabbed his attention, and he glanced down, struggling against whatever kept him bound.

Hang on. Lance presumed he’d been bound with rope but what the actual fuck?

“Is this… hair?”

Another noise startled him into casting his gaze upwards, and he choked on air. He could get on board with this any day of the year, because as batshit crazy a day it was, it was now on an upswing.

Because holy shit, his poor heart couldn’t stand this level of cute. Cute cute cute.

Cute overload.

Armed with a frying pan and an orange hamster perched on his shoulder, Lance met quite possibly the hottest guy he’d ever seen.

Lance stood corrected, and for the first time he didn’t care that he was wrong. This wasn’t the worst day ever anymore - more like the strangest he’s had in awhile.

(Nothing beat the time he was kidnapped by that creepy Galran prince and his friends had to rescue him. He still shuddered thinking about it.)

The frying pan pressed against Lance’s throat, and ow, his vocal chords. His neck smacked the back of the chair, and he considered what he did to deserve a death by kitchen utensil.

From his new position on the chair, Lance admired swirls of colour on the high ceiling. They weren’t paintings - the lines looked too calculated - yet they didn’t look like any constellation or diagram he’d seen before.

_Who are you, and how did you find me?_

The voice was harsh and disgruntled, but somehow it didn’t deter his attraction at all.

Why he doesn't use the more common way of communication was beyond Lance, the guy was a psychic, obviously so.

“I don't know why I’m here. I was running from a murderous horse, and I saw this tower so I climbed it.” The pressure on the pan increased, a perilous glare in his eyes.

“The name’s Lance, okay? I stole a crown, and I’m running from a lot right now, so could you please not turn me in?”

The guy blinked, expression quizzical, but he didn’t suspect the lie. Lance was far too skilled at it, enough to evade this psychic’s simple questions.

_You can call me Keith._

Wow. That name turned down his beautiful level by about five, but he wasn’t about to say that. Even if his levels of hot were so unfair Lance might cry, he was also scary as fuck. (He was conflicted, and honestly pretty turned on.)

Still, Keith was hesitating, and Lance only had one more trick up his sleeve to woo this dude into releasing him.

“Okay. It's time for the smoulder.”

Lance pulled off his best sexy face yet, but the other jerked his gaze in the other direction with a huff and stalked away, probably to stare into the distance like the emo he was.

The thing is, he was kinda attached to his hair, so Lance followed suit.

To be kind, his face high fived the floor. To be blunt, gravity betrayed him and his face smashed into the floor.

“ _You broke my smoulder_.” He choked out.

He didn’t even look fazed. What a dick.

Again, no words were spoken, but Lance heard his intent like he'd spoken aloud.

Do not lie to me.

Welp, he’d already lied once now - and Lance didn’t want to know what happened if he did it again and this lunatic caught on.

His words were muffled - because half of his face was smooshed into the floor - and his plea for release was unintelligible.

Lance was getting uncomfortable and the floor felt below freezing. Was this tower made of ice?

Keith narrowed his eyes at him, yanked him back upright, which woah, blood rush. He turned to the ferret, who seemed to nod with enthusiasm.

Again, what?

He removed the pan from its deadly pressure against his throat. Lance gasped for air, inwardly thanked both his lucky stars and the ferret that he wasn’t going to die by frying pan just yet.

It was then that he could concentrate enough (read: get enough oxygen to his brain) to take in the sight before him.

Lance could tell he wasn’t entirely human, but he was like nothing he's ever seen before.

That was a blatant lie - there was no question of his Galra heritage, if the distinctive yellow eyes and flicking velvet ears gave anything away.

But it was not a crush, because Keith was a stuck up prick who thought he was someone special when he wasn’t, and Lance didn’t hang around that type of people, nuh-uh.

He needed to change his train of thoughts before it went off the rails and oh shit, could Keith hear his inner monologue? By the way he glared, it seemed so, until Lance squinted and noticed his eyes were focused on something just above his head.

Lance spun around in his seat. There was a ginger hamster doing some sort of dance on the windowsill.

Silence, for about three seconds.

He turned back around to stare at Keith, raised an incredulous eyebrow.

“The fuck is that?”

The hamster squeaked in the tone of what Lance supposed an offended hamster would have.

He walked away again without answering, this time with enough hair to prevent Lance’s face meeting the floor again. He pulled back a dark curtain to reveal paintings, the not-quite-constellations again.

Equations written in all colours, tally charts that spilled onto the ceiling, skies the colour of a dusty twilight and bright golden lights so stunning, so filled with hope that Lance almost tipped the chair over with the force of it.

How long had Keith been there?

Lance shrugged, feigning nonchalance as he tried to evaluate his life story with one blank expression to work with.

“Can I ask what-”

_Floating stars. Once a year._

“Stars?”

_May twenty seventh. You will take me there, or you won’t leave this tower._

He knew better than to argue. “Yeah, sure, we can go see them, but the kingdom does want to kill me, so I’m not sure if this is going to-”

He cut himself off when faced with a colder glare than his mother's, and weighed up his options.

If he agreed, they'd be caught by that horse and brought back to the Garrison. But also, given he was held hostage by a beautiful kind-of-Galra guy, Lance didn’t have much of a choice.

“Why haven't you gone yourself?”

_I don't need anyone._

There’s a pause that borders on awkward. Desperate to break it, Lance relented within a few seconds and nodded.

“I'll do it.”

Keith nodded back, shoulders relaxing.

“I don't like this.” Lance assured him, but the other isn't listening, pulling on shoes and grabbing the pan.

“It’ll be easier to dodge rain.” He warned, one eyebrow raised.

_That's ridiculous. You can’t dodge rain._

“That's the- never mind.”

The hair he was once bound by fell to the ground. Lance didn’t even question it at that point, his day hurtling straight into fever dream levels of weird.

“Woah, hang on, where’s my satchel?”

Keith shoved the satchel into his arms, and the pan twitched once more, both ears flicking and eyes flashing yellow. He held onto his arms for a second longer than necessary, long enough that Lance blushed crimson.

(Aren't you going to take me on a date first? Lance didn’t ask, for fear of being smited.)

_We’re leaving._

Scrambling hastily into the window, Lance made the horrible, awful mistake of looking down.

Thank heavens he wasn’t scared of heights.

“Holy shit!”

Okay, he lied, he was a tiny bit scared of heights, but one wrong move and he was dead, so it's not an irrational fear.

Even as he managed to get ten feet down, his silent companion stood at the window, arms crossed and adamant to move.

“You coming?”

 _Eventually_.

He wasn’t wrong about the whole long way down thing, by the way. Lance settled in for a boring, nerve wracking few minutes.

—

After yet another long and awkward silence, he reached the bottom of the tower.

He stretched his arms out, aching from exertion, and grinned as Keith leaned out of the window and examined the grass with a skeptical expression.

“Let down your hair!”

Jet black waves cascaded down the tower, and a few seconds later Keith followed.

This crush would be a difficult one, exemplified as said crush hit the ground and spent twenty minutes sprinting around the forest, happy beyond belief.

Lance felt his stomach explode with butterflies, warm and fluffy, but he tried to make his voice sound more judgemental and less smitten.

“Haven't been out of the tower for a while, have you?”

Keith smiled, and kept running with the ferret perched on his shoulder.

\--

“Chin up, grumpy boots! It's an adventure!”

Keith crossed his arms and looked anywhere but Lance’s face. Yes, it may be an adventure, but he was supposed to make his partner earn his heart and be impressed with his swordsman skills.

Like an idiot, he’d forgotten the sword. He’d remembered Coran and some sort of weapon - y’know, a frying pan - but that didn’t stop his mood dropping to the level of dirt.

He sighed, kicking a stone into a nearby oak. What was supposed to be Keith's monumental, life changing day had cannonballed straight into awful.

When he’d first left the tower he could understand the meaning of freedom for the first time in ten thousand years. Now, he could go anywhere he wanted to, without running into stone bricks and Haggar's crooked smile, one that held all secrets and radiated deceptive sweetness.

But the awe and relief had worn off, and he was forced to face harsh reality.

It's certain she’d find out that he was gone, and her orb would find them in seconds, if that. Sooner or later, they’d encounter the witch, but Keith wasn’t worried for his own safety.

No, she was unable to survive unless he lived too, he was far too important an asset to be disposed of.

Lance, however? He was expendable.

And it terrified Keith.

To top it all off, he kept tripping over his hair, and each time he did Lance’s dumb adorable grin widened, while Keith’s irritation became more and more visible.

After he stumbled four times, Lance laughed ran a hand through his hair with a grace that almost made Keith fall again.

Almost.

“You know, I could braid that for you.”

And it turned out that no matter how much he protested, Lance is stubborn.

His endearing tenacity lead to how they end up with Keith sat cross-legged on a rock, Lance stood behind him, braiding his hair like they’re children.

His annoyance must've spilled into the bond, because Lance chuckled and shoved his shoulder.

“I used to do this all the time for my family back home.”

Keith didn’t think about how his voice sends shivers down his spine and his shoulder go up in flames, the blush on his cheeks heating up scarlet. It took every ounce of self control to keep his hair a neutral colour and not let it go bright pink.

And Lance kept talking, too. Rambling on about brothers and sisters, about how his hair was cooperating with surprising ease considering its immense length, about the amazing cake he had last week and how he’s determined to get the recipe.

Keith listened with such devoted intent it took Coran poking his foot three times to get his attention back down to his plane of existence. The dumb ferret would have a shit-eating grin on his face, so he ignored him.

“Aaaaand we’re done!”

Keith twirled and smiled again, happy that the new hairstyle prevented any more hair-related mishaps. For a second he swore he spotted Lance’s face grow warm before he turned back around.

They continue on their journey, Keith now walking with ease along the rocky path, but Lance never stopped talking, asking him almost too personal questions.

“Why do you wear those gloves all the time?”

_I've has them all my life._

“How old are you?”

_Nineteen. But I've been nineteen for a while._

“Cool. I’m eighteen.”

_Why do you wear that dumb waistcoat?_

“It's fashionable, you ignorant hermit!”

It was only a few minutes into their mundane back-and-forth when they paused once again.

Lance made a grand gesture with his arms.

“Voila! The Three Mice! Oh, how I’ve missed this place!”

He saw Keith's what the fuck is this expression, waving his arms and adding “Friendly, friendly people, they'll love you!”

Keith wasn’t convinced, but he had no time to act as Lance strode up to the door and swung it open with unnecessary dramatic flair, before doubling back to grab Keith’s arm and drag him inside.

The entire cavern fell silent, staring first at Lance, then at Keith and Coran, for what seemed like an eternity. An awkward silence ensued, but to his relief it’s short lived as a muscled looking woman approached them, the first to break the unsettled quiet.

Her voice was somehow comforting, and he couldn’t figure out why until he sees her up close. She reminded him of his mother in the brightness of her eyes and the toughness of her body, the determination he could feel emanating off her.

They moved further into the cavern, all eyes still on Keith with ill-concealed suspicion. Regardless, there was a mischievous glint is in the woman’s eyes as she grabbed their hands before he had time to react.

“So Lance, aren't you going to introduce us to your new boyfriend?”

Both of them go scarlet. Keith covered his face with his free hand to spare himself from seeing any more of Lance’s reaction in fear of spontaneous combustion.

He couldn't even die, but his adorable partner just might if he charms him any more or winks at him or- or just does anything.

Keith jolted back into the present day as the woman guffawed, dropping her python grip on their wrists to double over, and as if on cue the whole room seemed to relax, conversations picking back up and glasses clinking together.

“Oh shush.” replied Lance, flapping a hand in her personal space like it was no biggie to either of them. “You’re just jealous you didn’t see this cutie first!”

His mind tried to process, determine a logical reason as to why his heart was fluttering a mile a minute, but he pulled up a blank.

Lance blushed even harder, grinning at him like he hadn't outright flirted with him fifteen seconds ago, like they didn’t have an important mission to complete, right now, before Haggar returned and killed the universe’s most beautiful teenager.

 _The mission?_ He sighed. _Can we get on with it?_

“‘Course!” Lance leaned across the bar to tap Shay on the shoulder and hand her the satchel. “Here's the tiara for the Unilu dude. Keep it safe, yeah?”

“Yes, of course!”

Keith was offered a drink, and he accepted warily. It tasted of wine and hope, whatever that meant, but no matter how delicious it may have been Keith couldn’t drag his attention away from Lance.

Winking, pointing finger guns at pretty girls, all things that shouldn't conclude with Keith feeling his heart warm in a way it hadn’t done for a long time.

Yeah, he felt warm; the type of warm that enveloped him whenever Shiro praised him, or when his mother hugged him no matter what he’d done.

He didn’t like the unfamiliar emotion. His heart was cold, personality aloof, and it had to stay that way.

Emotions meant failure. If Haggar saw them she’d use them to her advantage, and Keith didn’t think his life could get any worse in that wretched tower but he really didn’t want to test that theory.

He liked this place, even if Shay’s questions were mortifying, for nobody brought up Keith's non speaking demeanour. It was as if he’d been there years instead of half an hour.

He even considered putting up with Lance’s constant flirting with the ladies for the sake of the mission, even if it sent stabs of jealousy through his heart. It was stupid to be envious, anyway. Lance liked women, and in no way was he Keith's.

His heart was frozen over, laced with pain, and one as amiable, as warm as Lance’s deserved the best of lovers.

He ignored the fact that Lance was the one who came to his mind, not someone that he might’ve stood a chance with. Not that he had any friends, being ancient and all, but at this point Prince Charming seemed like a more reliable choice.

But yes, while it was run down and half built into a tree, the Three Mice was a welcoming, kind place.

At least, until the door slammed open again, a man rushing forward with a pointed glare. He brandished a paper, a… wanted poster?

The person on it was familiar, but it wasn’t until Lance snatched it and covered the nose that he realised who it was.

He dragged a hand through his copper hair. “Who even draws these things? Can someone sack them, please?”

The man ignored his complaining. “This poster is proof that you, Lance McClain, will put us all to death!”

Keith didn’t know why he hadn’t expected this. He had been pretty open with the fact that he'd stolen a crown, after all.

Shay stepped in front of them, hands held in front of her with gentle defensiveness, and took slow steps towards the guy.

Lance’s hands clenched into fists, and Keith was at the mercy of the flex of his biceps, despite the urgency of the situation.

Shiro would have called him whipped. Keith disagreed. It was a crush and nothing more, and by the time Lance got a girlfriend he'd be over him. That Hunk guy on another poster he saw earlier was rather charming…

“Rax, why?” she cried, hands outstretched now.

Keith snapped back into reality, sneaking another guilty glance at the object of his affections. Lance appeared oblivious to his admiration, easing some of the embarrassment.

He smacked her hands away, scowl intensifying. “The Garrison will be here in under a dobosh, and I will not wait for them to arrive!”

He stomped out, footsteps echoing on dark, tired planks. The poster dropped from Lance’s hands, fluttering to the ground and landing with a feather’s grace.

As the door slammed shut with a dramatic bang (seriously, Keith was worried for that door), the Three Mice erupted into chaos.  
  
Keith was shoved every which way by concerned hands and concerned voices rising in pitch, and when he lost sight of Lance his heart pounded with increasing trepidation. Out there, with no knowledge of society or how to communicate with people or- or anything without his reluctant partner.

A hush fell over the room as someone yanked a lever and a trapdoor popped open. Shay jostled a confused Keith to Lance, who grabbed his hand and dragged him into the hidden tunnel as they heard the distant pounding hooves.

“That was fucking close.” he hissed, tension releasing his shoulders from their hunched position.

Keith couldn’t have agreed more, gathering his hair into his arms and hurrying along the passage. He’s slower than Lance, given his hair is heavy as fuck, and their difference in speed turned out to be more conspicuous than Keith had hoped.

“Move faster!” he chided, tightening his grip and tugging him along.

They were holding hands. Holding hands. He had to distract himself, or bad bad thoughts will appear. Uh-

_Why are the Garrison looking for you?_

(Holding hands.)

Lance huffed, the expression on his face not suiting him. “They've been after me for years now.”

_Why?_

“You haven't noticed? I've more or less committed every offence under the sun, and if I’m found they aren't going to be throwing a ball in my honour.”

_Why don't you do something safer?_

“What is this, an interrogation?”

Keith narrowed his eyes for the twentieth time that afternoon.

Their argument was cut short as Garrison horses gallop close behind, and they broke into a sprint toward the end of the passage.

\--

Haggar pulled her cape tighter around her, examining her hands. The spell was wearing off, brown Altean skin blemishing flawless purple. The disguise would last a few days more at most, but she didn’t want to wait.

She heard an unfamiliar voice calling not far from the tower, and sped up, not wanting to be spotted or have the gift discovered.

She reached the foot of the tower, resting for a moment. And shouldn’t the quintessence have been healing her now, since she was so close to the gift?

“Let down your hair,” she sang, impatience heavy in her tone.

Every muscle ached with cold and exhaustion, the light basket heavy in her weak arms. The strength the spell gave her was wearing off too. Haggar detested more than anything how frail she was when magic wasn’t flowing through her veins, but each year she lived the quintessence wore off faster than before, and the weakness was more familiar to her now.

After a few seconds of silence, Haggar called again. Thunder rumbled above her and she looked up to see the sun disappear behind dark clouds, a large storm brewing.

Two minutes passed, yet there was still no reply. Haggar began to worry something happened.

_If he's dead, the quintessence will never get to Sire, and I’ll be punished._

She growled, moving to break away the bricks that conceal the staircase. He'd hidden before, rebellious and careless, but she's shown him what befell those who misbehaved.

Haggar climbed the staircase, held up only by her waning mana, and threw open the trapdoor. The clang reverberated through the stifling silence.

No noise. Nothing, not even that blasted ferret scuttling across the stone.

“Keith?” she tried in her warmest voice, pulling down her hood. “I’ve brought a treat, your favourite food…”

She crept around the tower, opening curtains and shutters with a tentative smile on her face. It waversd when every crevice has been searched, yet the boy still hadn’t shown his face.

The smile dropped from her face conpletely when she realised why he was nowhere to be found.

True love found him first.

So he managed to escape her, huh? She cackled, although the panic of what her master would think kept her heartbeat raised and her senses on high alert.

Haggar clasped her hands together and an orb of violet magic materialised, swirling in threatening tendrils.

_Search for the gift and his soulmate._

The orb hesitated, but a glare from the witch revealed them mere minutes away, and by the look of it heading for some rundown cavern.

_Can I kill them both?_

The orb’s only reply was a reluctant no, and although she knew the answer Haggar‘s eye twitched, fangs grinding together.

The orb said nothing. All she could do was trap the boy again, then dispose of the mate. It would be difficult to do alone, but she didn’t want to alert her master of any… complications.

She didn’t care how far away he was, or what would be done with the mate. But she wanted the gift back.

\--

They stumbled out of the tunnel with few items to utilise as defence.

They were dead men walking, Lance realised with a jolt of panic. Not even his skills could get them both away unscathed. 

He reached for his satchel to protect it - but the familiar weight against his hip has gone.

There is no satchel, for he'd left it in the bar and forgotten to take it in the commotion.

His bow would be useless in close combat, and as talented as Keith was at pan-related close combat, he couldn’t protect both of them against a small army of soldiers.

Shit.

“Keith?” he murmured. “I don't have any weapons…”

_No need. We have to run._

But where could they run? The quarry was unstable at best, and as desperate as Lance was, he wasn’t about to jump off a cliff.

“So what are we supposed to-”

With their trademark awful timing, the Garrison arrived before they could think of a plan. Their general sat proud on a horse with the remainder on foot, bright yellow eyes glinting menacingly.

The place wasn’t the fanciest of battlefields but it would have to do, or Lance was certain he’d die there with the dust and splintered planks.

Keith tossed him the frying pan without a sound, fashioned his hair into a sort of lasso, swung himself across the quarry to safety, which sort of answered the weapons question, but sure as fuck didn’t answer the how do I survive this part.

He turned to see the horse he was chased by earlier, jerking his head forward with a sort of whinny, and the three soldiers next to the horse lunged at Lance.

On instinct, he aimed the pan for their heads and hit each of them square in the nose, payback for the god-awful ones his wanted posters displayed.

“Frying pans!” he exclaimed, adrenaline pumping and heart racing. “Who knew, right?”

The general growled, moving off the horse and stalking toward Lance, but soon enough he's on the floor, too.

Seriously, Zarkon needed to employ better soldiers.

He peered down at Keith, who appeared to have a plan involving his hair and fastening said hair around many wooden poles. His face twisted into a determined scowl, and maybe Lance was hit in the head too hard but he thought it was the most adorable thing he’d ever seen.

Still, whatever the plan was he hoped Keith would finish soon. The horse was advancing much faster than the soldiers had, with the added benefit of a sword clamped between his teeth.

“Can you please just let me go?“ he begged, because he didn’t want to die by a horses hand, (hoof?) but the horse only snorted and went for him.

Lance can't help but think that his day had gotten real weird, real fast. One minute he was stealing a tiara, the next he was helping some psychic cutie see some floating lanterns, then he was fighting a horse. Was he tripping, or…

Frying pans were fucking marvellous weapons, don't get him wrong, but even they give up after a beating from a horse. It flew off the cliff, hitting the ground some time later with a distant noise of defeat, and Lance felt his heart try and play twister with his stomach. 

His day got even weirder, if that was even possible, as familiar hair wrapped around his wrist and yanked him away from the crazy horse. On the plus side he was still alive, but on the other he ended up landing on a series of unsafe, unstable planks, running along them only for them to collapse, breaking the dam.

Water cascaded toward them both, and after a shared glance they darted into the last visible shelter, the horse close behind.

And because the universe couldn’t screw them over enough, there was a huge rock descending onto the entrance. They only just made it before the horse did, Lance having the foresight to grab the frying pan in the process.

In the tiny cave, guaranteed death, Lance focused on nothing but the water. Even as they scrambled to the highest point, onto a ledge just big enough for the two of them, all he really saw was the rising level of blue.

It rose to their knees, then to their waists, in what couldn’t have been longer than thirty ticks.

He glanced down into the likely cause of his demise, regretting doing so soon afterwards when all he could see was is darkness and the reality of their imminent death.

The water reaches their chins, and Lance decided to spend his last few seconds gazing at his new crush when Keith’s eyes widened in realisation, before he shut them tight.

Both of them tipped their heads skyward, but the water was already there, closing over them.

All went black.

At least until Keith’s hair started glowing a brilliant scarlet.

This was a trick, right? His brain playing cruel games on his conscious? Perhaps he’d actually gone and lost it?

Keith's glowing hair gestured to a weak part of the rocks, and Lance didn’t hesitate in swimming toward it, Keith following.

Rocks fell away piece by piece, the sting in his eyes only a small distraction. It took seconds for the gap to form, spilling bright sunlight, a sliver of hope that they'd get out of the ordeal alive.

But then the glow was fading, his lungs burning and the water glacial against his skin. The rocks became too heavy to even imagine moving and he was losing consciousness.

A current shoved him through the rocks, hard, sweet air embracing his lungs for a single second before he tumbled into a river.

It was the third terrible landing he'd had that day.

The impact knocked the wind out of him as water trapped him under with fatal pressure. Lance used the last of his strength to swim like he’d never done before, hauling himself onto land not unlike a beached whale.

Yeah, he was safe, for now. By some miracle he wasn’t dead and he could breathe and there was light-

But then reality kicked in. He searched for Keith with panic still rushing through his blood but he was there, right next to him, gasping for oxygen as he was. Lance had never been so relieved to see a grumpy magical teenager with the most beautiful eyes in all of Altea.

—

Thirty seconds passed, then thirty more, before they caught their breath.

The water was cold, the merciless wind biting their skin even colder, but they managed to scrape together a fire. Its flames flickered every so often but stayed strong, until the last of their light was the embers and the violet hue of dusk.

The sharp aroma of crackling embers tickled his throat. If he shut his eyes and imagined hard enough it was almost like he was home again, hearing his family sing songs around the campfire as the small children play games and the older ones sneaked into the forest to drink.

But he wasn’t thinking of the past, not anymore. Thinking of home only got him into trouble, and they didn’t need any more trouble than they already had.

So, in true Lance fashion, he occupied himself with ignoring his crush and admiring him simultaneously. In fact he was so focused on Keith unbraiding his hair (so it’d dry faster) that it took a full twenty minutes for it to become a high priority.

It being his hand, covered in scarlet blood that dripping onto the grass below him with a steady rhythm. The pain kicked in not long after he realised, shock wearing off, and he hissed.

Keith looked over, startled, then did a double take. He grabbed the injured arm with _no regard_ to Lance’s poor hand, who squeaked, more like the hamster than himself.

“Woah, hey, calm down, cowboy-”

He glared daggers at Lance, and sent the equivalent of _does this look like a fucking calm situation to you_ through the look.

Eyebrows drawing together in thought, his face lit up, or at least it’s equivalent in Keith’s blank-faced universe, and before he could protest Lance’s hand was wrapped up in hair like a damp, magical bandage.

Keith closed his eyes, the tension dropping out of his shoulders, and it was like they were back in the cave. It wasn't even an hour ago and that was far too many near death experiences for Lance today so he hoped whatever Keith was up to wasn’t, y’know, life threatening.

Lance still hadn’t decided whether it was going to kill him when a familiar glow danced down Keith’s hair and flowed into the blood soaked hand. As adrenaline decided to have a clearance sale in his bloodstream, two things happened.

The first thing was Keith locking eyes with him, quiet urgency in his stare, grabbing Lance’s other hand.

The second thing was Lance realising that his brain hadn't dreamed up the magic hair but that it had, actually and literally, happened.

It’s not like he’d never heard of magic before, Pidge was a well known spellcaster, but healing magic? Taking only a few seconds to work? Something else was at play here.

By the time the events absorbed into his brain, Keith's hair finished it’s mystical juju, unwrapping itself from his hand.

His flawless, healed hand. There wasn’t even a scar, or any of his older scars. The small pink line from falling off his bed as an eight year old, the circular dot from the time he broke his finger, both replaced by tan skin, unbroken and new.

Lance opened his mouth, about to shriek loud enough to wake the dead, when _Please don't freak out!_ rang through his mind as if if was shouted.

“No I’m not freaking out I’m,” he rocked back and forth, “curious as to why your hair glows and heals and- and everything.”

He bit his lip, hard, forcing himself to calm down before he ran all the way back home and cried into his mother’s shoulder before bothering to say hello.

_It's a gift._

“Does this- this gift explain why your hair isn't tangled despite being long as fuck and why it seems to move of its own accord, sometimes?”

Keith nodded. Violet irises gazed deep into his own, and Lance felt his panic fizzle out into nothing under his spell.

“Do you - ah - know anything else about this gift? At all?”

Keith shook his head too quickly to be telling the truth, but he was too tired to enquire further.

Lance was, although calmer than before, incredibly disturbed by the chain of events.

“Okay. Okay. I'm- going to sleep.”

_I'll keep watch. I don't need sleep._

It was difficult to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. “Of course.”

\--

Keith did, in fact, need sleep. Even then the tiredness and exhaustion pulled at him tantalisingly, but he stayed awake.

(His determination would keep him alert. Maybe.)

There was much to consider, anyway - his life had changed a lot since two days ago.

His surroundings, for one. Even in his sleep Lance leaned towards the currents, and the twilight sure was pretty but his companion was gorgeous, quite literally the definition of tall, dark and handsome.

Get him some of that, ‘cause _damn_.

This made it a blessing and a curse to watch over him at night. Yes, he could admire his crush in all his glory, but his nerves refused to calm down.

His ears twitched every few seconds and his eyes darted around him each time something fluttered, the familiar panic of paranoia settling in.

There was a rustle of leaves much louder than the others, the snap of a twig, and he tried to reassure himself it was probably a rabbit but he couldn’t shake the terrifying thought that something- someone - was out there.

It didn’t take long for his resolve to crack, and he decided he'd do a quick perimeter check, not far enough to lose Lance’s aura but far enough to eliminate any threat.

At the thought of Lance he glanced over at him. He slept in relative peace, mouth hanging open and one leg dangling off the log. Lance was accidentally adorable, and his heart melted faster than he could say ‘accidentally adorable’.

Just a quick check of the area. Lance would be safe. He wouldn’t be gone long.

Despite that, he had the looming feeling that the danger wasn’t there for him.

\--

Lance was dreaming.

He knew this because the edges of his vision were fuzzy, and he felt less like he was in control and more like he was watching a film in first person.

The dream was still vivid, however, and he took in the details he didn’t usually see: sunshine, the dusting of freckles across Keith’s nose, Keith’s fluffy hair. They laid on the bed, a warm sapphire mess of velvet sheets, and he'd never felt so at peace.

He leaned in closer, closer, until-

—

So it turned out Lance couldn’t have anything remotely nice in his life, because he was violently thrown awake again by some unknown force.

Gone was gazing into Keith’s eyes like there was no tomorrow - instead he was upside down.

In a forest.

Moving? He didn’t know. He'd just had the dream of his life ripped away from him.

It takes some effort, but he managed to open his eyes enough to see Altea was less than a few miles away, and also that he was on a horse.

How heavily did he sleep?

From his angle, flopped over the equine drunken-side-saddle style, he couldn’t see the name of it - but did he really need to wonder?

“Hey!”

The horse stopped abruptly, nearly throwing him off. Lance righted himself quickly and hopped onto the ground, straightening his clothes with an accusing glare fixed on the horse.

“The fuck do you think you're doing? Where's Keith?”

The horse did the equivalent of a shrug, then started shuffling towards him with a ‘not my problem’ attitude, which in Lance’s humble opinion, was not okay.

“Right, we are waiting here for Keith, and- don't give me that look he's coming for me-”

_Lance?_

“See? He's here now, so-”

Keith sprung out of the shadows and stood protectively in front of him. Lance shifted and puffed out his chest, standing tall and crossing his arms. His icy glare didn’t lessen.

_I know you want to take him to the prison. But I need him, now._

“Are you-”

 _Shut up, Lance._ He turned back to the horse. _Tomorrow you can fight all you want._

The horse exhaled sharply, then turned around and displayed its saddle.

Keith got on immediately, arranged his hair onto his lap, and held out his hand for Lance to follow.

_Oh, calm down. Given I keep all of my promises, he's decided to give us a ride to Altea._

Oh. Lance couldn’t really argue, and when he thought about it the positives did outweigh the negatives.

Did he mention how much he loves Keith’s hair? Well, on this horse his face is practically buried in it.

Thanks, horse.

\--

Altea was a thriving place. Anywhere you went, merchants called out to you in friendly voices and children sing nursery rhymes as they doodled on the pavement in chalk. Half the time somebody is playing the guitar and singing in a soft voice, and people crowd around to listen.

It was like they weren’t even being ruled by some evil Galra. Weird what ten millennia could do to a society.

It's busy nature was both a blessing and a curse for them, having to hide a wanted criminal and a dude with seventy feet of hair - hair that Lance spent forever braiding for the second time, by the way.

Luck was on their side once more as it was market day, and Lance watched with an ill concealed blush as Keith flitted from stall to stall in a rare display of excitement, picking up this and that before he realised they barely have enough units to get them a room to sleep in.

Was stealing legal if one did it for someone they love? Probably not, but still….

The remainder of the day was spent stealing apples, making faces at each other, and ducking behind well placed statues whenever they spotted guard.

They crept away from the market as the sun began to set.

_Where are we sleeping tonight?_

“Sleeping? I thought we were going to see the lanterns.”

_Yeah, and when you get us caught we'll have a wonderful view from our cell._

“Whatever, you drama queen. Let's just find an inn.”

As expected, most of the inns were full, but in another stroke of luck they found a room in one, slightly run down with its orange-yellow walls and teal shutters and warm atmosphere, filling Lance with nostalgia that tore into his heart and filled his lungs until he couldn’t breathe.

He snapped out of it as the landlady lead them down a well lit corridor to their room. They'd asked for a two-bed and he hoped it'd be bigger than usual, give him space from Keith and his overwhelming beauty.

Keith was completely consumed by looking at every little detail he saw - paintings, curtains, even the little ceramic cats on the windowsills as they passed them.

Their luck ran out when the short old lady turned the key in the lock and revealed what was beyond the wooden door.

The room was barely big enough for two people to sleep comfortably, furnished with a wardrobe, some shelves, and one bed.

One, oak bed, with blue gingham sheets and a red bird-shaped cushion in the centre of the pillows. In any other situation he would’ve leaped onto the mattress the second he saw it he just... stared.

The lady let them be with a sly smile, and Lance frowned.

_How do we sleep, then?_

“I thought you didn't need sleep?"

_I may have lied about... that._

He didn’t trust himself enough to not blurt out something stupid, so he made some ungodly indignant noise instead, which in hindsight sounded a lot worse.

_Shut up!_

He yawned and Lance didn’t know him well enough to know whether he was being overdramatic or it was another Keith thing.

_I’m tired, so I’m gonna-_

Keith practically sprinted across the threshold and threw himself onto the bed.

Lance flapped a hand at him and made an irritated noise, turning away to examine the small selection of books on a worn oak bookshelf. Judging by the sun they had a few hours to kill until the lanterns lit up the sky in its absence, so why not read some… fairytales?

Alright, sure, whatever. Better than staring out the window.

There was movement behind him, and Keith delicately runs his hand along the books with a wistful expression and as his hand bumped into Lance’s they both jerked their heads up in surprise.

_You like books?_

“Of course…?”

A breeze hit them both through the draughty window, chilling him to the bone, and it was looking at Keith’s face in the descending sunlight that he realised how inadequate he was.

\--

“I’m going to get some firewood. It’s freezing.”

Lance's voice was too quiet for his radiant personality, and Keith was immediately worried that something was wrong.

Yeah, there was a problem. But while Keith preferred to stay quiet about the matter of his emotions even before the curse, once one knew him his feelings became clear in his mannerisms. Shiro told him so back when it had been one month since their parents were murdered by Haggar and forced them on the run, one day before the duo were found and captured.

Lance was a completely different being. Even if Keith earned the privilege to know him well, he’d still find ways to surprise him each and every second they would be together. He was quickly coming to the realisation that just because Lance was smiling didn’t guarantee he truly meant it.

But before Keith could try and stop him leaving alone he was gone, leaving him alone with the flames and his thoughts. The flickers of amber calmed him, and he sighed dejectedly.

_I’m safe._

“Are you sure, gift?”

Keith spun around, drew his blade.

Haggar smiled in that horrific, child traumatising way. “Did you think I would not find you?”

You- you- None of it made sense.

“I followed you.”

The witch looked decidedly awful, blotchy purple face obscured by stark white hair, cloak muddy and littered with dead leaves.

_Leave me alone!_

“How can I, when I need your quintessence more than ever?”

 _You will not touch my hair_.

“I don't need your permission, gift.” Her voice dripped sugared poison, yet hardened in warning.

They both froze at the sound of footsteps outside, and Keith panicked. If Lance ever saw Haggar-

Give me until tomorrow night. I'll be done by then. Take me back to the tower, do whatever. Let me confess to him.

Haggar pretended to think, tapping a manicured finger against her chin. “And if I decide to kill you?”

He gave a dry laugh, humourless. _Then the world will be free of two wretched souls._

She softened her expression slightly, perplexing Keith, and patted him on the head. Before he could think to smack her hand away, she disappeared into the darkness with a sweep of her cloak and a haunting chuckle.

A flock of birds fly up from a nearby tree and scared the shit out of him as Lance reappeared not a tick later, arms full of firewood in a pile that covered almost his entire face. He placed them beside the burner, giving Keith a puzzled look. “What are you doing standing up like that?”

Lance couldn’t know a thing, or Haggar would surely kill him.

 _It's all fine!_ He feigned a smile that refused to meet his eyes.

He was still skeptical, Keith could tell, but it was better than death. Anything was better than that, especially when it concerned Lance.

It had barely been a few days, yet he would sacrifice everything if it meant another moment with him, another glimpse of his smile. With that, Keith became the ultimate cliche, bashfully kicking his feet against the ground hard enough to scuff his boots.

(Hopefully Lance didn’t notice the wear and tear in him that must’ve been showing by now.)

_Shall we go to the lanterns?_

“Sure.”

\--

The streets were mostly empty, but he could hear the voices of the townspeople from a mile away. Their voices are excited, happy, and Lance felt exactly the same way with Keith by his side.

Said guy thrust his hands into his pockets and looked up, toward the first lanterns glimmering way up high. He’d never looked so… alluring, before, and Lance blushed, cheeks tinted rose pink.

_People are really enthusiastic, huh?_

“Yeah, I guess.”

 _Why do they do it? The lanterns, I mean_.

He thought for a moment, stretching his arms in front of him. “It's a show of strength against the Galra - I think. They can't prove it's something rebellious, so they can't stop it, y’know?”

_That’s… genius._

“It is.”

There was a comfortable quiet until they reached the parade, people releasing their lanterns into the sea of gold. The pair of them pushed their way near the outskirts of the town square as a string quartet played softly in the background - but he failed to notice their melody. In fact, he barely registered the lanterns.

Lance once held the opinion that nothing was more beautiful than the lanterns; their bright gold colour, the lit up sky, the hope that it brought.

He was wrong, deadly wrong, because the most beautiful thing he'd seen in all his seventeen years of life was the flecks of gold shimmering in Keith's violet eyes, the pure wonder on his face, the way he turned to Lance with an ear splitting grin and grabbed his hands with childlike excitement.

_Look, there's a dance in the square!_

"Aren't we supposed to be hiding from, y'know, everybody?"

Keith refused to listen, just dragged him towards the square as the music livened up somewhere close by, spinning him around with a spring in his step.

He'd never been happier than in his arms, as the strings played almost wistfully while they spun.

As they danced more couples joined them and it's like he was a child once more, singing and laughing and happiness radiating through the people surrounding them.

  
Someone handed him a drink that burned when he gulped it down, and Keith snatched the cup to drink the remainder, scrunching up his face in disgust.

_What even is that?_

Lance laughed for the thousandth time. His face hurt. "It's just champagne, honey."

Keith flushed right the way down to his collarbone at the nickname and it was so adorable he feared for his safety. For a moment he was sure it was a dream, that the perfection that chose to dance with him, when he could have anyone, was a mere figment of his imagination.

But the shine in his eyes and the melody of his laughter was impossible for someone like him to dream up, so it must’ve been real....

—

The alcohol was actually pretty damn strong, and he was struck with the urge to loudly proclaim that to everyone dancing nearby, but Keith smacked him on the back of the head and he floated back down to reality. He didn’t know what was in the drinks, but he needed another, immediately.

The drinks that followed just added to his buzz, and as he got considerably more drunk his hands moved considerably closer to Keith’s butt. Neither of them were complaining, by the look of it.

Eventually the glow of the lanterns dimmed, and some of the noise quieted, but Lance refused to tear his gaze away from Keith. He sobered up enough to notice there had been no music for a while, and they’d been dancing in silence like lunatics.

Despite this, the woman at the stall opposite them smiled broadly. He wondered if the lady thought they were together, but the ridiculous thought left him as quickly as it entered his brain, because obviously Keith didn’t want to date him.

He chuckled. “Should we leave, my love?”

Keith smiled and saluted clumsily, nearly falling over in the process. _Aye aye, Captain._

They stumbled their way back to the inn, and it was easier to hold onto Keith and pretend he’d see him again after it was all said and done.

\--

“Well, I’m gonna hit the sack, so…”

Keith was puzzled by his choice of words and Lance facepalmed, barely concealing a sigh.

“It's nothing. “

_I wouldn't mind sharing the bed, you know._

Lance went completely red, the flush running past the collar of his shirt (that he really wished was off him) but Keith knew he must be the same. He cursed his drunken lack of filter.

“I'd be,” he cleared his throat, “Fine. With that.”

Never mind. Keith blessed his drunken lack of filter.

They undressed as much as they dared and clambered into bed, Lance still drunk and Keith still tipsy.

“G’night, princess.” It was an ill-fitting nickname for him, but it did nothing to quell the bubbling affection in his stomach.

_Good night._

Except it wasn’t really not a good night, especially when Lance dropped off.

Not like he was snoring or anything, more like making these snuffling noises every now and then that melted his heart just that little bit more. It was also the night he discovered that sleeping next to Lance was like sleeping next to a raging fire, because surely that kind of warmth should’ve been concerning emanating from one human. Still, Lance was unaffected by it all, even burrowing further under the blankets after a while.

It was a few minutes later when it happened - Keith shifted in the bed, and Lance decided that he wasn’t warm enough already and it would’ve been better to roll half onto him instead, face shoved in his neck and puffing hot air.

If it wasn’t bad enough (good enough?), he laced his exhales with these occasional groans - that made Keith feels simultaneously like a creep and stupidly turned on in a very short time period.

God bless Altea. Could someone save him?

\--

When he enquired, he heard that Lance slept well, considering his bright early morning smiling. Keith didn’t sleep until well into the night.

Enough light had filtered through the leaves to declare it morning, so they agreed to leave. This time, when the old lady complimented their cuteness as a couple Lance didn’t react, just smiled and politely thanked her as Keith blushed himself onto another plane of existence.

_This has been fun-_

“Lance McClain, your crimes hold the punishment of hanging.”

As they stepped out into the bright summer streets, they were faced with a small army of guards holding a large arsenal of weapons with them.

Keith couldn’t breathe as they approached him. Lance had made some mistakes, he knew that the Garrison weren’t exactly best friends with him, but not the type of mistake that carried the death penalty…

Were there that many lies about his past, or was he merely incredibly uninformed?

He started forward, intending to protest, but Lance was faster. His expression was an unreadable mask, but Keith saw in his eyes and his mind that he knew about this eventuality. He couldn’t bring himself to feel betrayed.

“Run to the cavern. Please.” His voice was too full of emotion for Keith to disobey, and too shocked to stop himself he turned and ran, not daring to look back even as he heard Lance make a scene.

“Hey you, cabrones, tell me again why you think it’s easy to arrest me-” There was the unmistakable sound of a punch being thrown, and in the resulting chaos not one guard was unoccupied enough to remember the criminal’s accomplice.

The glimpse of eye contact filled him with things too heavy to handle - terror, envy, dread, sadness. Lance was a terrifyingly capable liar, but he couldn’t shake the image of the truthful begging in those blue eyes.

He turned the corner and tripped over an invisible force. Keith knew what was coming, even though muddled thoughts and disoriented eyes. They focused on a dark figure with two-toned skin, and his heart sunk into his stomach despite expecting her.

“Back so soon? It doesn't seem like an entire day to me, gift.”

_Fuck you._

“You kiss your mother with that mouth? Wait - she's dead!”

She cackled as she muttered an incantation, and Keith’s anger drowned under a sea of grey into the terrifying bliss of unconsciousness.

\--

Allura growled and ran her hands through her hair in a rare show of impoliteness, roughly shuffling her cards.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Why were they apart instead of furiously making out? Why weren’t they being more cautious?

Alas, she could change nothing, only hoped it’d all work out.

\--

Lance sat still in his cell for a total of three minutes, before he was too restless to do anything but pace from wall to wall.

He'd failed. He would be dead before he could get back to the tower, and there would be no chance for Keith to kill his posthumous body.

Because he’d face the unforgiving noose in less than ten minutes, and there was no way out.

“McClain. Two minutes.”

Ah. So in two minutes, maybe a couple more if he struggled, he’d be nothing but a corpse.

It was fitting, honestly. Seventeen years of working nonstop, and he never achieved anything more than mediocrity. He'd die and be forgotten, but it didn’t sadden him like it should’ve.

“Guard?” Numb. Needed a distraction.  
“Could you tell me a story?”

“Oh, there's no time for a story.” The guard turned to him, smiled dangerously. “Call me Ulaz. We’re going to escape this prison.”

\--

Keith started awake, in the tower.

No candles were lit, the only light coming from the lightning outside the window.

Struggling was pointless. His hands were fastened tight.

“Oh!” Haggar. “You're awake!”

He blinked, half woozy from the spell, but a lazy flick of her wrist later and he was fully awake, awareness almost knocking the wind out of him.

_This wasn’t our deal. Let me go!_

“Am I known for keeping promises?” She chided, pulling the invisible leash toward her. He followed with an icy glare, and her own yellow gaze flashed with the thrill of a challenge.

Instead of taking the bait she pouted and leaned down patronisingly, patting him on the head. “There's no need to be so grumpy! We’re going somewhere no one will ever find you.”

Keith spat in her face. His stomach churned with a sickening cocktail of nerves and anger.

_I will never, ever, go with you, crazy old hag._

It was her worst, most awful nightmare to be old, and he knew it.

Haggar slowly wipers her cheek, humorlessly smiling with all of her fangs on display. He could almost see poison dripping from her tongue, flickers of rage in her gaze, swirls of black magic beneath her fingertips.

“We’ll live happily ever after!”

\--

“What? How?” Lance ran a hand through his hair.

“You don’t think you outran the Garrison on your own, did you?”

He would’ve responded, in a polite and not-shrieking way, but as a pair of guards halted at their cell Ulaz put a finger to his own lips and he shut up.

The three of them led Lance down a long, plain corridor. Every time he passed a window he watched the weather descend into a storm, pounding rain and deafening thunder, dark skies illuminated by lightning.

“Sendak. Prorok.” They answered in the affirmative, looking away from their prisoner to meet Ulaz’s eyes, grip tightening on Lance as a silent warning.

He swung his sword to the backs of their heads, knocking them out cold.

So cool!

He threw Lance the frying pan with effortless… effortlessness, hidden in a nook not far from where the guards laid unconscious.

“This was… planned?”

Ulaz yanked his arm in the other direction. He briefly wondered if this Galra has ever smiled, or at least smirked or something.

“Let's go, McClain. Time is short.”

Turned out he wa right. They didn’t have much time at all, only making it into the courtyard before a watchman spotted them and sent an army after their sorry asses. Said army was strong and many in number, no match for one guard with a sword and a guy with a frying pan.

It would be an impossible feat to beat all of them alone, but to his utmost relief they didn’t have to.

The silhouettes of Pidge, Hunk, and Shay shone through the curtain of rain as rocks rose from the ground and crushed the majority of the soldiers in one fell swoop. One punch knockouts, rocks from thin air - how has he survived so many torturous years of life but not known these badass people well enough to liven it up?

Pidge stepped forward when they reached them. “I’ll deal with the survivors. I'm a skilled enough mage to hold my own, and somebody here must know something about my brother.”

She left no time for argument as she sprinted towards the fight, casting truth spells and death spells alike in a desperate search for answers, merciless. It reminded Lance disturbingly of Keith, but he shook the idea out of his head - there was no point daydreaming about a guy who hated his guts.

Ulaz turned away too, pulling up his hood. “I’m afraid I cannot follow, either. Until next time, McClain.”

He left too, leaving only three in the courtyard. The whole encounter was impressive - until he slipped on a puddle and landed face first onto the ground. The Galra scrambled up again, and hustled away.

There was a moment where nobody spoke, until Hunk furrowed his brow and lifted a hand. “Who was that guy?”

“I think they're part of a rebel group?” It was a subpar answer, but he had no other - Ulaz was some mysterious ass dude and it wasn’t exactly like they had time to become best buddies on the path to his death.

Shay smiled. “It seems the Balmera answered our call. Shall we continue on our journey to your beloved?”

“How… did you know?”

“I have my ways, especially when it comes to love.” She winked at him, but otherwise er face stayed stoic.

He ground his teeth and sighed. “He's not my- okay, fine.” Lance didn’t even question her.

\--

The forest was more haunting at night, when all you could hear was the pounding of rain and shallow breathing. It was like they’d been walking for eternity, but finally Shay halted, the rest of them stumbling to a stop behind her.

“What’s up?”

She was all sympathetic smiles and overcast eyes, too kind for Lance to meet her gaze.

“This is where our journey ends. The Balmera tells me that only Lance can progress from here.”

He glanced worriedly at Hunk, who stepped back, expression as puzzled as his own. Still, he obliged. Anyone as powerful as Shay, capable of communicating with the goddess Balmera, was worth listening to.

So Lance continued on his path, in a dark, dingy forest at stupid o'clock in the morning.

_How am I supposed to get out of here?_

As if they heard his thoughts (and there was a decent chance they could) blue spirits illuminated the way, whispering amongst themselves. Passing them, he picked up a few murmurs, but nothing more.

Faeries who existed to guide others on their way, to wherever they were destined to end up. Lance's abuela used to call them Destiny’s servants, for they carried out her desires to bring true love to every soul.

He dearly missed his family, was consumed in thought about them, memories of giggling voices filling his mind, comforting him.

Lance had no idea where the lights were leading him, could do nothing but follow them aimlessly through vines and caves alike.

The wisps disappeared then reappeared with a whisper of noise, the only sound aside from Lance’s breathing. Silences like those, where everything stilled, when not even the rain or the flutter of birds’ wings could be heard, were eerily disquieting.

He was both relieved and perplexed when the fae led him to the tower. He’d found Keith, why else would the fae have taken him there, but why fate decided it he could not answer.

Keith definitely hadn’t made it to the Three Mice, and whoever would be up there with him would be powerful enough to kill them both. He needed to move carefully.

Lance rushed through the valley, tripping over rocks he couldn’t see in the darkness, up to the bottom of the tower.

And luck was on his side yet again, because Keith is there, at the top of the tower, smiling and serene. There was something off about him that Lance associated with the absurdity of the situation, and brushed it aside.

He was just being paranoid.

He grinned, relief flooding through him. “Let down your hair!”

Keith did, and Lance let himself be pulled up, unable to tear his gaze away from the guy in the tower.

When he reached the top, he didn’t expect to see what was before him: the Keith he first saw dissipate into nothingness, revealing Real Keith handcuffed by cursed chains, and the witch Lance recognised as Haggar turning to him with a knowing glare.

“Let him go!” he yelled, with increasing trepidation.

Deep down he knew how it would end. He wasn’t as stupid as he let on.

“Oh!” she purred, as fear trickled up his spine. “We were expecting you weren't we, sunshine?”

Keith struggled, eyes wide and pupils blown. Lance, in an act of pure, fearless impulse, sauntered up to the witch and punched her in the face.

Hey, he was dying anyway, might as well have a cool story too.

She stumbled backwards, shattering the mirror she’d spent so long admiring herself in, and shards fell around them like deadly rain. Lance heard Keith gasp as she cried in unadulterated rage, hair falling over her face.

“You know full well what his name is, bitch.” he hissed, where she was doubled over.

It took a minute, but Haggar straightened up. She clutched her cheek where Lance had struck her, and narrowed her yellow eyes into dangerous slits.

It was okay, though. Everything would go to plan. She'd hurt him, not Keith.

Turning toward Keith, she smiled. He could almost hear the cogs turning in her twisted mind.

“You love him, isn't that so? Why don't you be the one to kill him?

Keith's eyes widened even further, and Lance heard the shout in his mind as if it was said aloud.

_No! You can't do this!_

“Oh, but I can.” Haggar flicked her wrist and the cuffs released Keith, but before he could move he was at the druid’s mercy. They both were.

Excruciatingly slow, he moved toward Lance, drawing his blade with steady hands. His body was sure in his movements, but his face displayed agony greater than no other.

“Keith? What’s going on?”

Haggar froze Lance’s movement, and Keith’s arm raised like a puppet.

With every step it was like the pain in those eyes increased a thousand times over, and maybe it was too late but he realised he didn’t want to die like this, dead in a tower nobody would find him in.

_Please. I’m sorry._

The blade pierced through Lance, drawing a scream from his lungs, but the initial awfulness was all he could comprehend.

Everything was too numb, too bright, too loud. He glanced down to see the knife's handle and a patch of blood staining his favourite shirt. Distantly, he mourned the loss of one of his last memories of his mother.

Tears ran down Keith’s face as the spell was broken, his face crumpled in pain.

_Please, Haggar._

The witch kept both of them in place, and strolled casually to Lance, who spat in her face, because it wasn’t like he'd survive.

“This would never have happened if you hadn’t stolen my gift from my tower!”

He may have been dying, he may have been stabbed by the man he loved, but it’d take much more to break him, even if it took all his energy to gurgle out an answer.

“You...sick…bitch.”

Haggar gripped him by the neck, and Lance lost consciousness to Keith screaming in his mind and the witch laughing hysterically.

\---

_Let me save him, and you can do whatever you want with me._

Haggar sneered. “It seems that love is a strange thing. You have the secret of immortality, boy, why would you choose to burden yourself with a mate?”

He tugged against his chains, but his attempts at escape did little to weaken them.

Haggar’s claws gripped tighter, and as streaks of crimson blood ran down Lance’s neck fury coursed through Keith’s veins.

“I’m going to kill him, just like I killed your brother.”

Keith stopped his protest, everything coming to a standstill.

A Garrison soldier shot him during an interrogation. You told me.

“Have I ever told you the truth? I murdered him, and you know what his last words were?”

Her voice was mocking, careless, druid magic giving a perfect impression of Shiro.

“ _Tell my brother I love him!_ Pathetic.”

Keith, restrained and powerless, felt nothing but rage, but before he could do anything else reckless he heard Shiro’s voice. Not by druid magic, but a memory, and it was like he was eleven again.

_Patience yields focus._

Keith had no idea what it meant, but he calmed, and as his Galra features made themselves known, he realised that if he didn’t do something soon Lance would surely die.

(Haggar would have to wait to feel his wrath. Perhaps that was what his brother meant. He’d never know.)

 _Please_. he begged her. _Let me save him. Or I will fight you, and never stop fighting you until the day I kill you._

Lance coughed and his wound gushed with blood. Keith felt familiar dread bubbling up in his heart, threatening to overflow into full on hysteria. He had to save him.

Haggar held his glare, calculating yellow eyes boring into violet, before she acquiesced, dropping Lance onto the floor and releasing Keith with a muttered chant.

“Fine. Be quick.”

He ran over, wrapping his hair around Lance’s torso and shutting his eyes with shaking hands, but a choked “Keith?” stopped him from casting the enchantment.

A half-smile from Lance was the last thing he expected to break his heart, yet there he was.

“Keith. Don't do this. Please.”

 _No_.

Haggar tapped her foot. “I’m waiting.”

Lance lifted his hand to brush against Keith’s cheek, but it was strange… almost calculated.

No, that would have been ridiculous. He closed his eyes, focusing on his quintessence, but as his brain put the pieces together and his eyes snapped open it was too late, the glass in Lance’s palm slicing through Keith's hair.

The ruby tinge to it faded and died, his usual jet black hue returning to the remainder of his hair.

_Lance!_

Haggar shrieked, her youthful Galra body receding into her ancient, Altean one, skin thinning and strength dwindling.

Her actual body was hideous as her quintessence fuelled one, but Keith no longer cared about her. The man he loved was bleeding out on the floor, and it was his fault. He’d never forgive himself if he couldn’t save him.

Fear, heavier than himself, turned his arms to lead and weighed down his legs. Horror rushed through his blood like it was him who was inches from death. Time sped up and Keith held on desperately to their remaining seconds, but it slipped between his fingers like sand and ran out in the blink of an eye.

Lance coughed again, choking on blood for a terrifying second, and they were both kidding themselves if they thought he’d stay conscious for another minute. Somehow, in the face of death, he beamed. Lance was so devastatingly beautiful, and Keith would never see him after that day.

_Stay with me._

The wound gushed blood again, covering Keith's hands and hair. His voice was slurred and mumbled, but comprehensible enough to bring tears to his eyes.

“You know, we are a good team.”

A stuttering breath, then nothing.

Silence and stillness overcame the room, both of them processing it.

_He’s gone._

The witch stepped forward, despite her being almost dead herself. “He's gone. Come along.”

_You killed him._

“Of course I killed him. What are you, stupid?”

_You killed him!_

She muttered the binding curse again as she continued toward him, Keith's arms snapping behind his back against his will.

The witch was fast in her advance, but Coran was faster, taking Keith's long hair between his teeth and pulling, hard.

Haggar didn’t see it, consumed in her vanity, and tripped, tumbling out of the window. As she fell she screamed for aid, but he stayed put, clutching Lance in his arms as soon as he was free.

Keith didn’t feel sad. He didn’t feel happy, or angry.

He was… empty.

(He noticed that the blood on his hands matched his tunic almost identically, and didn’t dwell on it any longer.)

Curling around Lance’s unnaturally quiet body he rested his head over the wound, but no matter how many times he pressed his hair to it and projected the enchantment, Lance refused to wake up. His heart did not beat, his hands were ice cold, his eyes stayed shut, their piercing dark blue irises nowhere to be seen.

For Lance was, in every way, dead.

\---

Where am I?

“Wherever you want to be.”

I want to be with Keith.

“Then with Keith you will be.”

\---

Even after so long isolated in the very room they lay in, Keith had never felt so alone. Coran kept his distance, watching quietly from where he was perched in a wooden beam.

Keith’s eyes welled with tears. This gift was supposed to bring joy to the world, right? But everything he did drives his loved ones away or hurt them or worse.

He was actually crying now, how pathetic, tears falling onto Lance and ruining his blue waistcoat.

Keith sat up with jerky movements, away from Lance’s too-silent heart, furiously willing away the urge to let any other emotion show. Now he's being dramatic. (Like Lance used to be.)

He didn’t cry anymore. The effort of it drained every last drop of energy from the deepest, purest part of him.

He was delirious with grief, so much so that he almost missed the swirls of crimson rising from Lance in angelic tendrils, colour matching perfectly to Keith’s hair in its magic form.

The swirls surrounded both of them, so brilliantly bright it blinded Keith for a second.

When his vision blurred back into clarity he was greeted by an alive, disoriented Lance blinking sleepily at him.

“Hey there, cowboy. Whoa-”

Purely on instinct, he lunged forward and wrapped his arms around the fool with a python grip.

“You miss me, mullet man? Get it? Cause you have a mullet?”

Shut up! Wonderful, he’d started blubbering too.

Lance rolled his eyes, but a smirk crept into the corner of his mouth. “Alright, never mind then.”

Keith got the joke, he wasn’t that sheltered, but he was too busy processing the information of Lance is alive, and nothing else mattered but that.

Nothing else mattered but Lance.

Speaking of Lance, he took a deep breath - as if bracing himself - and pulled away from Keith.

Keith couldn’t figure out if he was dreaming, if in real life he was going to wake up and Lance was on the ground again, or if he'd wake up alone in the tower.

He leaned in, voice soft and expression even softer. “Is… this okay?”

Everything was okay with him. With Lance, Keith was safe. He had a family in him, and that may have been the scariest thing he'd faced in all his years of life.

Yes. He nodded too, making sure Lance knew that he has absolutely no problem with… uh.

That.

Lance moved closer, brushing Keith’s hair from his eyes, and without any warning, they’re kissing.

Everything became clear; like putting on glasses or wiping condensation from a window or having a sudden epiphany. Keith's eyes closed and his brain switched off completely. By the time it turned back on the kiss had long since ended.

After what felt like an eternity of bliss, lips not quite together but not quite apart, he opened his eyes. Their foreheads were still touching, Lance's eyes so close he almost saw the emotions and thoughts flickering through them.

The hazy cloud in his thoughts cleared and sense shoved its way back into his consciousness.

And Keith felt it. So sudden he couldn’t have possibly anticipated it, but it's like he’d been waiting for it to happen all along.

Every second with Lance - drinking in the bar, braiding hair, healing him, laughing with him, learning each of his expressions.

Ethereal all the same.

He didn’t know what it was, this feeling, but what he did know was that he wasn’t close enough. He wanted to hold onto it until the day he died, and it was then he realised what the feeling was.

It was what true love’s kiss felt like.

Knowing someone loved you as much as you loved them. Holding their fragile heart in your hands although you could drop it at any second, and knowing that they could do the exact same. Did that mean..? He didn’t know.

His huge grin must’ve looked stupid, but he was happy, goddammit, even if he half expected to wake up into the nightmare his life used to be. With that, the confined of the curse lifted completely from his voice, and Keith placed one hand on his neck with an awed smile.

His emotions halted his thoughts completely, and all he could say was his only thought about Lance since the first time he looked into those cobalt blue eyes.

"I love you."

  
That was not what he intended his first words to be. Shit, what if Lance didn’t reciprocate his feelings? And-

“I love you too.”

Oh. Okay.

Lance looked puzzled. “Not that I don't love this, but this speech thing, it's part of the ‘gift’, right?”

“No.”

“Are you going to expand on that, Miss Chatterbox?” he quipped, raising an eyebrow. “I more than deserve an explanation here.”

Keith argued lots of things, but the truth was not one of them.

(...Most of the time.)

“I was cursed. That's why I couldn’t speak. And, the cure for the curse is…” he finished in a mumble too quiet to hear.

“What?”

“True love's kiss.”

Lance appeared to be surprised in the bad way, which was expected - this hadn’t been planned at all, and Keith felt like he needed to take a moment to collect himself because when did his instincts ever give him warning before ruining his life?

What wasn’t expected was the huge hug Keith was enveloped in. It grounded him, gave him something to cling to in all the chaos, and he took the much needed moment to calm down.

(Oops. Sorry, instincts.)

“Wow.” he mumbled in his ear, gravelly and low in a very not-Lance way. It sent shivers down Keith’s spine.

“So if I’d kissed you the first time I met you like I wanted, we could've been soulmates? Oh man, that kinda sucks…”

“Oh well,” he perked up, kissing Keith’s cheek, “All the more affection for you.”

He went pink. “Shut up.” It was a silly attempt at distancing himself; he was smitten and they both knew it.

They kiss again, and didn’t stop drinking in one another like starved men at sea until the sun set and the stars illuminated their faces.

—

When the moon was at its peak, Keith tried to drag them somewhere more comfortable to sleep than the floor - the bed, for example, but before he even got to his knees Lance was yanking him back into his lap with a tired hmmph.

That settled it.

—

The sunrise cast a gentle bubblegum-pink light where Keith fidgeted in Lance's lap, unsure.

“You're beautiful, you know.”

He shook his head and dropped his gaze toward his feet, blushing profusely, wringing his hands with nerves. He was unable stay away for long, though, transfixed by irresistible ocean eyes searching deep into his own.

For once, he wasn’t threatened, or on edge. To be honest, he was fucking terrified, but also elated, heart swelling and overflowing.

He didn’t know what to do. It'd never been like this, warm and loved as he stared into eyes so deeply blue Keith worries he’d drown.

That was an irrational thought, anyway - he'd been trapped in that mischievous gaze since he first saw them. The eyes themselves belonged to a man with a heart bigger than Keith himself - although he’d surely argue otherwise. His soulmate was destined to give his trust to him, of all people, him, with a horrible past and an even worse personality.

Some things were confusing about Lance, though. Lance was the prettiest teenage boy ever created, sunlight dancing off the planes of his face and a heart so pure Keith worried his own, dark soul would taint it. He had self-esteem issues that Keith didn’t understand, alongside obvious eyesight problems because if Keith ever looked even half as hot as the angel standing before him he’d believe Zarkon has a soul.

With a jolt and an embarrassed cough he realised that he'd been dreamily gazing at Lance for some time, and Keith’s only excuse, as cheesy as it sounded, was that it was difficult to keep track of time when Lance smiled.

His fairytale books described love as the greatest emotion one could experience, but he digressed. Keith was so in love it broke his heart, but it was the best kind of heartbreak he's ever felt.

“You're more gorgeous than anyone I’ve ever met.”

  
Unlike his earlier inner monologue, those words end up jumbled, stuttered, and Keith imagined slapping himself. He was supposed to say that with a smirk dancing his lips and confidence running through his veins, but the moment he made eye contact his brain gave up on him.

Christ, he disgusts himself with the sweetness of it all.

Lance went even pinker, biting his lip and glancing away with a nervous laugh. Keith felt the butterflies in his stomach flutter.

How is it possible for one person to be so adorable and hot at the same time?

Awash with newfound confidence Keith grinned, revealing all of his sharp ass fangs, and Lance blanched.

Oh. Oh shit, he’d forgotten to tell him about the Thing.

Y’know, the important, game changing tidbit of information, the teeny little fact that could have fucked up their whole dynamic.

“Okay- uh, I have something to tell you.”  
He inhaled sharply. “I’m half-Galra?”

The silence that followed deafened him. His stomach opened up into a pit of anxiety and doubt - there was about a thousand different ways he could have worded it better than that.

(As if Lance didn’t already think he was backwards in sentiment and an utter basket case, this would do it.)

To his relief, he didn’t react that way to finding out his soulmate was part of a corrupt, black-hearted race.

“I know. it's pretty obvious.” The words were spoken against his lips and near incomprehensible, but Keith had never been so relieved so fast.

“...Even if you are pretty small.”

They may have been soulmates, to have and to love and whatever else, but when someone deserved a smack to the back of their head, Keith showed no mercy.

“Shut up and _kiss me_.”

Lance’s blush hit scarlet status and he became very interested in a tile just above Keith’s head. (Nice to know he was getting better at the whole flirting thing.)

His eyes fluttered shut, closed the gap, Keith following suit with an embarrassing sound that made Lance smirk against them. They kiss with a passion that wasn’t all that appropriate for the time or place, multiplied by their awful morning breath, but neither of them minded.

It took a while, but at some point they broke apart to gasp for air, and he took the opportunity to blurt out more mortifying shit, because why not?

“I was worried that you’d hate me, given that the Galra hate you and all.”

Lance had that self-deprecating look on his face, and Keith wanted to banish that expression to hell, only allow smiles and happiness to radiate from him.

“I could never hate you. After all - your mistakes are equivalent to my successes-”

“Well I wouldn't say-”

Lance shook his shoulders gently, eyes wide. “You are _literally_ the _human embodiment of sunshine!”_

He understood. He'd been there before, never better than his brother, always second best. Anyhow, knowing Lance felt the same hurt him.

Keith wasn’t known for his comforting abilities, never had been, so he flung his arms around him and shoved his face into his neck.

It seemed to do the trick, Lance freezing for a moment before relaxing.

A rare spike of protection rose above the hazy glow they were in, Keith tightening his hold. Nothing would happen to him as long as he was alive to make sure. Nobody would harm him, not then and not ever.

They stayed like that for a while, until rational thought and hunger forced himself off Lance’s lap and into the pantry to find food.

Keith wondered what their future had in store. What would happen after their smiles faded and the novelty of a relationship wore off? When they fought, when they thought everything is over?

Glancing back with concern, he watched Lance sit up and dust himself off, grumbling at the scarlet stain on his shirt as if that’d somehow make it disappear.

The moment he caught Keith's gaze he gave him a wry smile, the kind of smile that lit up the whole world, so damn beautiful it stole his breath away, so stunning he could have written an entire book on it.

It would be titled.... The Eighth Wonder of the World, and it'd have multiple volumes.

(One book for every smile.)

—

Keith didn’t care that his mate wasn’t Galra, or that he’d ended up back in the tower after all the trouble they'd gone to so he could leave.

He didn’t care that the days ahead were uncertain and unforeseen, that sometimes he’d be burdened and stressed and sad.

He wasn’t worried about the fact that underneath the wonderful moments would come awful fights, breakups and disagreements, insults flying and pottery smashing.

Lance would give him plenty to do, plenty to talk about, and the boredom he once felt was forever in the past. Lance was a star - he brightened up a place in ways Keith couldn’t even fathom, any feeling that wasn’t utter bliss joining the witch at the foot of the tower, beside the brambles and the roses.

Finally he was _free_ , for soulmates are the exception for every rule - and they fully intended to exploit that fact.

**Author's Note:**

> ok if ur wondering who kaltenecker was. he’s the horse.  
> i’m so sorry i killed off shiro lol  
> anyway leave a review if you liked this work, or check me out on twitter @samuraiklance  
> 


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